Spring is Sprung!

The grass has rise.....

Wow - Spring is hitting our garden in a big way! Waikato has had a heap of rain in the last month or two, and the vege garden is loving it.

When we moved into this house it had almost nothing planted in the gardens. 1 Lemon tree, a feijoa, a small mandarin tree, a cherry plum tree, and a couple of bitsy things. In fact - it seemed to us that the people who had the house before us hated all things green!

Its immensely satisfying when spring rolls around, and you can take photos like these of things in your yard that are thriving, that weren't there 12months ago - and wouldn't be if you hadn't bought the house.



We have lots more plans, but they are waiting on our boundary fence being corrected.....




I've just sowed 2 egg trays of seeds to be planted in a few weeks, so it will be a matter of clearing some space. And of course we have the seed potatoes there ready to go in, once the garden goes in.

House shots

So we bought an older house when we got to NZ. Its in fairly good nick considering its nearly 40 years old, but there is a huge section of land (1012m2) and next to nothing on it.

So we have kicked in and starting doing a few things!


Here is my herb garden - I bought the old laundry tub of trade me for $25, not sure if that was expensive or not, but until we get a vege garden up and running, seemed like a good option. I like it - and the kids are having fun pulling the stone wall apart.

Here is the shade sail. We bought it pretty much unused from the girl guides back home, and then bought the 4 poles for about $30 each, and I dug the holes and we concreted them in about 1m each. Its great - and once we get the gardens all put in around the area and the yucky trees ripped out, it will be even nicer. I'm hoping to mainly have natives in the garden, unfortunately at the moment everything we have in the garden is native to other countries!! Not sure I want the lillypillies..... They have awful roots and their flowers attract lots of bees, which sucks next to kids play areas!


Here is the back yard. As you can see - completely blank canvas!!! We need to put an orchard in the back somewhere and resow the grass after levelling the ground. In 5 years it will be totally cool!!!



This is the deck that Shane has started putting on. Day 4-5 of The Great Deck Build..... fun fun fun!!! It will be wonderful once its done, but unfrotunately the nail gun has died, and he is having to nail by hand - not happy jan!!



And here are the kids shots. Hamish being just like Dad. First the screwdriver, then the beer can. Kids!!!




So no socks finished yet - but I have been busy!! I also made some curtains for our room, and a blind is nearly finished. I have got about 10% through my sock that has to be finished in 4 days. But its really hard when Shane is busy working and the kids want in then out then in then out.... Enough excuses - I have dinner to make!

Our tassie splurge

This was the big ticket item we bought from the Salamanca markets on our Tassie holiday in April. The chap had all these wonderful mirrors with Tassie woods, and this sort of pattern we liked best, so it was made for us.
Obviously no two mirrors the same!

The border is Blackheart Sassafras, which is a surprise, cause my favourite tassie woods are actually myrtle and huon pine, and most of my furniture have these golden/reddy/honey like tones. This one is very different, but for some reason we both preferred it, and since we have such different taste, if there is ever anything we agree on, we have to get it!
So after we ordered, about 3-4 w later we got a call on the Tuesday night saying it was ready to pick up off the ferry at 6:30am the next morning. gee thanks... lots of warning. How to arrange a babysitter with all this notice!
In the end shane took an RDO, and he drove up.

Its mammoth, weighs about 25kg, so we needed a special rail system to hold it up, and finally it went up yesterday.

I love it, it looks like its meant to be there, and will be one of my most favourite wall ornaments for many years tocome.

God I hope it doesn't fall off!!!